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May 14, 2005

Dear Congressman John Conyers,

Growing up in Detroit, Michigan I have always appreciated your concern for issues of social justice. You have always been a friend to the disadvantaged and vulnerable members of our society. I was pleased to see you once again taking the lead in an investigation of possible voting fraud in last fall's election.

This is why I am so concerned today that you appear to have fallen under the influence of a Greek lobbying group that is promoting racism in Greece and the world at large. While I know that you are quite aware of forces in American society that foster and promote racism, I believe that you and your staff have not had the same opportunity to examine the history and practices of certain forms of racism in Greek society.

You, no doubt, are acquainted with many of the better-publicized examples of ethnic groups who have historically oppressed weaker, more vulnerable neighboring people. The Turkish killing of Armenians in the early 20th century, the murder of Jews by the Nazis during World War Two, the Chinese brutal occupation of Tibet and the recent suffering of a minority population at the hands of government-encouraged militias in Sudan immediately come to mind.

Sadly, the majority of Greeks are today in denial concerning their society's mistreatment of the ethnic Macedonian minority among them. Wars of national liberation from Turkish colonial rule in the 19th and early 20th centuries in the Balkans easily turned into turf wars in which the weaker and more vulnerable ethnic groups suffered terribly at the hands of their more powerful neighbors. As a result, the victorious dominant Greeks have had to spend considerable time, energy and expense in recent times in propaganda campaigns to deny the existence of the Macedonian people whose land they took.

Macedonian people in northern Greece today still suffer from harsh racist treatment at the hands of their Greek neighbors. Groups such as Human Rights Watch have documented the suppression of their language, culture and identity there. Institutionalized racism has denied Macedonians the public use of their language and even the right to identify themselves with their traditional name going back many hundreds of years. The Greek government has also denied the right of return of the thousands of Macedonians forced into exile during past wars, a process which continues today due to on-going suppression of their language, culture and identity in Greece. I am certain that your staff will have no trouble finding the documentation of this gathered by human rights groups over the years in even the most cursory of internet web searches.

There is much to admire in the Greek people, and in their history and culture, just as there is much to admire in Chinese civilization, or in the southern white people of the United States. You and your staff are keenly aware of the tragic consequences of the institutionalized and deep-seated multi-generational racism in southern white society in the US. You are probably also aware of some of the rationalizations that the Chinese people employ in order to explain and justify their continued occupation of Tibet. Now it is the responsibility of you and your staff to educate yourselves concerning the social and historical record of racism among the Greek people that fuels the Greek lobby that is today working to deny the Macedonian people their historic name and identity. Sincerely,

Dr. Michael Seraphinoff